Recovering from World War I

A period of significant change followed World War I. The 1919 Treaty of Versailles fully blamed Germany for the war and sought to punish it by assessing reparations of more than $33 billion and physically shrinking the country. New countries emerged through the redrawing of Europe’s maps. Massive physical rebuilding was necessary in former combat areas in Europe, while the United States emerged as a major player in world politics and a creditor nation on the brink of prosperity. The economic repercussions of the treaty proved devastating in Germany, where economic instability and mistrust of the new government opened the door for the rise of the Nazi Party. In Asia, Japan was growing in both political and military power, positioning itself as a force throughout the Pacific. Yet in the 1920s and 1930s, hope still prevailed that no such conflict would ever occur again, underscored by international efforts to both prevent war and intervene in aggression before it rose to the status of war.            All images referenced in this podcast can be found at https://openstax.org/books/world-history-volume-2/pages/12-1-recovering-from-world-war-i            Welcome to A Journey into Human History.    This podcast will attempt to tell the whole human story.       The content contained in this podcast was produced by OpenStax and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.     Access for free at https://openstax.org/books/world-history-volume-2/pages/1-introduction    Podcast produced by Miranda Casturo as a Creative Common Sense production.

Om Podcasten

Welcome to a journey into human history. This podcast will attempt to tell the whole human story. You may be asking yourself what is history? Is it simply a record of things people have done? Is it what writer Maya Angelou suggested—a way to meet the pain of the past and overcome it? Or is it, as Winston Churchill said, a chronicle by the victors, an interpretation by those who write it? History is all this and more. Above all else, it is a path to knowing why we are the way we are—all our greatness, all our faults—and therefore a means for us to understand ourselves and change for the better. But history serves this function only if it is a true reflection of the past. It cannot be a way to mask the darker parts of human nature, nor a way to justify acts of previous generations. It is the historian’s task to paint as clear a picture as sources will allow. Will history ever be a perfect telling of the human tale? No. There are voices we may never hear. Yet each new history book written and each new source uncovered reveal an ever more precise record of events around the world. You are about to take a journey into human history. The content contained in this podcast was produced by OpenStax and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License. For more information please review the links and resources in the description. Podcast produced by Miranda Casturo as a creative common sense production.